We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.

Umm, no, the boss can afford to be "short and to the point." Because the boss doesn't have to be clear on details - he leaves that to others. The boss also doesn't have to CC everyone because, again, he leaves that to others. The boss just has to tell one person, and if that person doesn't get the message out it is his fault, not the boss's.

If a subordinate isn't clear in his email - he is too blame. If the subordinate doesn't tell everyone who should know - then, again, it is his fault for not getting the word out. So, the subordinate has to be wordy, covering every possible scenario, and CC everyone in his emails. It is called CYA. Boss's rarely have to CYA because they have others to cover it for them.

RE: Eric Duncan's treatment was "racist."

Umm, again, no. the white patients were "planned" visits. The hospitals knew ahead of time who was coming, when, and why. So, they were able to prepare for them.

Duncan showed up "out of the blue" so to speak, was unaware himself what he had and Jackson expects the staff to perform miracles?

Both these two RE's are related. Jackson fancies himself as the CEO of "America is Racist," Inc. He just has to send the "short and to the point" email (e.g. America is racist) and leave it to others to find a solution. The staff caring for Duncan are to blame, just like the subordinates who send an unclear email and don't CC everyone because they aren't the CEO of "America is racist," Inc.; They are the subordinates who have no one else to CYA for them.

Diabetes rates remain unchanged. What has changed is that in countries with modern health care doctors have begun a program to identify people with diabetes earlier in life so that their health outcomes will be better. The second cause of the increase in England and the U.S. is the massive immigration from countries where that population has double and even quadruple the diabetes rates of Europeans. The fact that they drink orange juice is no more significant then the fact that they now bath more then once a week. It is the classic example of a research study with a conclusion in search of something to reinforce the researcher's bias.

French: Voting with their feet. Muslims: Invading one by one by one by one...to redress their loss at the Battle of Tours. And then there was the link to an article about The Daily Mash, and example of which is
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/environment/britain-to-be-hit-by-entirely-typical-weather-201110174431

As I read the Amazon article, the phrase that played in the back of my mind was "F*ck Hachette". I don't think that was what the author intended ;) I almost feel sorry for leftists stuck with supporting last century's industries. They seem old and out of touch.

Barry, when they said we needed to fight a war against Ebola, they didn't mean a "real" war. Hire local security for the clinics and round a MP battalion that provided security for a base hospital in Afghanistan.

The story says that Duncan "told the DOCTORS" he had recently traveled from Africa. According to the news reports, that's FALSE. Duncan apparently told the ER nurse, who recorded that in her notes, but he didn't tell the doctor - and (it appears) neither did the nurse.

The hospital was quick to point out that the nurse recorded Duncan's visit to Africa in her notes which were "available" to the other health care providers. However, the hospital never says that either the nurse or Duncan directly informed the doctor of his travel.

How could this happen?

First, so called quality assurance guidelines and rules have been mandated by the federal government to make us think we are getting quality care. The problem is that these rules - which hospitals and doctors must follow or suffer financial punishments - mandate that health care providers record volumes of information that is not pertinent. Doctors simply don't have enough time to peruse the nursing notes and in an ER situation either rely on their own discussion with the patient or on the nurse to verbally relay pertinent and significant data.

Second, as Obama boasted, his health care vision was to reduce costs by "cutting out a lot of the fat" in health care. The problem is that a lot of the so called "fat" is spending enough time chatting with the patient so that one can get a feel for things other than raw data and facts, to give the patient a chance to mention things that one would not typically ask about, and to explore answers in more detail.

It's my bet that having told the nurse about his African travel, Duncan felt no need to tell the doctor. The nurse may not have told the doctor either because she didn't recognize the significance or simply didn't have the time - the federal government lets us know that they are only concerned about what she writes in the chart, not what she tells the doctor. Based on past experience, the doctor views reading pages of nurses notes about information not pertinent to the case (like does the patient have a health care power of attorney, does anyone abuse him at home, has he had a tetanus shot, is he an organ donor, etc.) as a waste of valuable time.

It's my assertion that it's our federal government's policies that attempt to give the perception of quality while actually reducing quality that led to this oversight. If we truly want quality medical care, we must insist that the federal government stop meddling with quality issues, cost issues and access issues - all of which are made worse when Washington tries to make us think they are solving the problems that they, in reality, have created.

My first experience w/ AirBnB was wonderful ... stayed in a downtown condo in Nashville. It was in a condo four stories above street level.
I'm not so sure about vacationing in a shipping container, though!

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